The PickUp After Parker Job
by hollow echos
Summary: For the prompt: "Parker gets distracted. All the time. She picks up books and pencils and paper, absolutely anything that can be interesting to a thief. The problem is that she doesn't put things back."


Team: Thief  
>Category: HumorCrackFic  
>Title: The Pick-Up After Parker Job<br>Rating/Warnings(if any): PG  
>Word Count: 979<br>Submission: For prompt humor #7: "Parker gets distracted. All the time. She picks up books and pencils and paper, absolutely anything that can be interesting to a thief. The problem is that she doesn't put things back. That leaves the rest of the team to pick up after her, and it drives them crazy."

O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O- O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O

**The Pick-Up After Parker Job**

"Man Nate, I know you find it annoying sometimes that we always chill here. But buying a lumpy couch to drive us out on our movie nights? That's just cruel," Hardison grumbled, sitting forward a bit and rubbing at a particularly sore spot near his hip where it felt like something had been digging in against his leg for the last hour or so. He stuck a hand down into the side of the couch and pulled out the offending item.

He dropped it, startled at what he found. "Whoa, Eliot. This kind of takes that paranoia streak of yours to a whole new level."

Eliot's eyes were narrowed on the knife where it had clattered to the floor. "Would anyone like to enlighten me as to why my one hundred dollar bread knife was buried in the couch cushions?" he asked in a dangerously level voice. He slowly wound his glare around the room, looking for even a hint of guilt from any of them. He was very good at reading people.

Did it surprise him when Parker had that Cheshire grin on her face? The one that meant trouble? Not really.

She bounded off the back of the couch from where she'd been perched and snatched the knife off the floor, clutching it to her chest protectively. "That's mine!"

He growled and shook his head. "No, Parker. That would be mine." He held out his hand, motioning for her to hand it over.

She trudged over, dropped the knife listlessly into his hand and retreated; he faintly heard her muttering to herself, something about finders- keepers. Her shoulders slumped, though, and when she returned to her perch her arms were crossed across her chest and she had her lip out, pouting.

He ran a finger along the knife. The once-pristine blade had been significantly dulled. "What were you using this for, Parker? It looks like my knife took a ride through the blender. And please don't tell me that's what you did with it." A slight shudder went through him. His juicer had been the latest casualty of this ongoing war of attrition. He still wasn't quite sure what had happened there, but he'd ran into Parker carrying it, in three pieces, out to the backyard to 'give it a proper burial.' He hadn't even batted an eye when she'd tromped through the apartment and out back to the garden a few minutes later with a shovel.

"That would be silly," Parker said, smirking. "I was sharpening marshmallow sticks! Nate said we could have a fire and make s'mores after we finished our next con!"

Eliot sighed. "You are aware this is a bread knife, right? Like for bread and stuff?"

She nodded. "I tried the butter knife, first. But it didn't work. This one had little jaggy bits that were perfect!"

"And it was in the couch cushions, why again?"

"So I could find it," she said as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

"Right…and the drawer wouldn't have worked equally well, where everyone could find it?"

She shook her head back and forth furiously. "Nope."

"Alright then," the hitter said. "You do this with lots of stuff?"

"You don't?" she shot back at him. There was skepticism in her voice, one eyebrow raised as if she couldn't imagine anyone not hiding stuff away like a squirrel hiding nuts for the winter.

There was a collective epiphany right about then for the whole crew. Each one of them had been commenting for nearly a year, now, on how Nate's place was kind of like a black hole. You took things in, and somehow they never found their way out again. Seemed like that black hole was actually named Parker.

She trailed after them like a shadow as they moved through the apartment, room to room, looking in any place that even remotely resembled a good hiding spot. It was a little disconcerting; really, the way that smile grew a bit wider each time they found something, like they were being clued in on one of her Very Special Secrets.

Sophie found one her favorite high-heeled shoes in a vase. Eliot wasn't shocked at all when he found his missing car keys. She had actually split open a throw pillow, shoved them in, and then stitched the thing shut again.

A good hour later and they had a sizeable pile in the middle of the living room floor of everything Parker had filched. They divvied up the pile and retreated to their respective apartments to catalog everything the little thief had managed to swipe right out from under their noses.

It was the next day as Eliot was chopping vegetables in the kitchen when Parker sauntered in. She eyed him, cocking her head a bit, before crossing over to one of the drawers. She popped it open and went digging inside. As Eliot had kind of expected, she walked away with his new breadknife in hand. At least she tried to, until it jerked her to a halt. She frowned at the steel cable he'd attached, one end to the knife, one end bolted to the underside of the counter. No way was this knife walking off.

Defeated, she dropped the knife, leaving it swinging back and forth by its tether as trotted out of the room, emitting a frustrated growl. Before the knife had even stopped its pendulum swings, she was back. He did a double take. She had bolt cutters in her hand, _his_ bolt cutters. He hadn't even ever brought those over here…

Before he could open his mouth she had cut the tether and was skipping out the room, humming.

There were some battles you just couldn't win, he thought to himself with a sigh. He made a mental note to stop and buy another bread knife on the way home.

-THE END-

O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O- O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O


End file.
